The Developer.com Product of the Year 2006 Nominations Begin Soon!

It's the Tools That Make the Difference. — Help Us Determine Which is Best!

You can be the greatest coder in the world and be able to leap over tall buildings in a single bound but your effort and time may be wasted if you are not working with the best tools available. Herein lies the rub, which tools are the best?

Developer.com, with your assistance, plans to name the best tools available going into 2006. In October we start our annual search for the Develop.com Product of the Year. Here is your chance to let it be known which technology, products, and tools are the best in their respective categories.

Categories

The categories for this year are:

• Technology: This should be more of a concept, a procedure, standard, or methodology, not a product.
• Framework: A development and execution environment that includes different programming and scripting languages, libraries, and support programs and allow them to work together seamlessly.
• Development Tool: A product aimed at the creation of software applications and solutions.
• Development Utility: Debuggers, testing utilities, and other support tools and utilities.
• Database Tool or Add-in: A tool or add-in used in creating database applications.
• Wireless/Mobile Development Tool or Add-in: A tool or add-in used in creating wireless/mobile applications.
• Web Service Development Tool or Add-in: A tool or add-in used in creating Web services.
• Java Tool or Add-in: A tool or add-in used in creating Java applications.
• JSR: The JSR (Java Specification Request) created within the Java Community Process that has had the most impact on how you develop in Java.
• .NET Tool or Add-in: A tool or add-in used in creating .NET applications.
• Security Tool or Add-in: A tool or add-in used in implementing security within an application.
• Open Source Tool: An Open Source tool or add-in used in creating applications.

Timeframe for Developer.com Product of the Year 2006

Nominations begin in early October and last throughout that month. When nominations begin, readers will find a nomination link at the top of our home page (where it currently says "Developer.com Product of the Year 2005 Winners are Announced"). That link will be changed to say "Make Your Nominations for Developer.com Product of the Year 2006 Now!". Click that link to make your nominations.

Final voting begins in early November and runs throughout that month. The winners will be announced in early January 2006.

The winners will be presented with an award and given the privilege of displaying the Developer.com Product of the Year 2006 logo on their web site and associated marketing literature.

In 2005, Sun Receives the Developer.com Product of the Year for Six Products

Sun had a fantastic showing in last year's Product of the Year contest. It walked away with six of the ten awards. Earlier this year Developer.com got the opportunity to deliver all six of Sun's Developer.com Product of the Year 2005 awards to Sun at their "All-Hands" meeting. There were approximately 120 to 140 Sun developers in attendance.

Accepting on Sun's behalf were

• Tim Cramer, Director of NetBeans IDE -- NetBean.org, for Open Source Tool of the Year: NetBeans IDE From NetBean.org
• John Treacy, Director of Sun Java Studio Creator, for Java Tool of the Year: Sun Java Studio Creator
• Janet Breuer, Software Engineering Manager, for Web Service or Related Tool of the Year: Java Web Service Developer Pack
• Shannon Lynch, Director of J2ME Wireless Toolkit 2.2, for Wireless/Mobile Development Product of the Year: J2ME Wireless Toolkit 2.2
• Jeet Kaul, Director of Java J2EE, for Enterprise Development Tool of the Year: Java J2EE
• Laurie Tolson, Vice President, for Technology of the Year: Java 2 Standard Edition 5.0

Figure 1: Sun management accepting awards for Developer.com Product of the Year 2005.

Click here to see the entire list of 2005 winners.

If you have any questions contact Rosemarie Graham with Product of the Year Question in the subject line.